THANDIE NEWTON (Laura Wilson) was most recently seen in Oliver Stone's W opposite Josh Brolin, in which she played Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, and Guy Ritchie's RocknRolla with Gerard Butler and Tom Wilkinson.

Previously she was in David Schwimmer's comedy Run Fat Boy Run with Hank Azaria and Simon Pegg. Newton was praised for her work in the Academy Award-winning Best Picture of 2006, Crash, for which she received both SAG (Best Ensemble) and BAFTA (Outstanding Supporting Actress) Awards.

At age 16, while studying modern dance at the London Art Educational School, she won the lead role in the critically acclaimed 1990 coming-of-age film, Flirting. Newton returned to England to earn a B.A. with honors in anthropology at Cambridge, while also acting in feature films for Neil Jordan, Interview with a Vampire, and James Ivory's Jefferson in Paris.

Other credits include Norbit, Gridlock'd, Bernardo Bertolucci's Besieged, The Pursuit of Happyness, The Truth About Charlie, Mission Impossible 2 and Jonathan Demme's Beloved.

Her television credits include guest appearances as Kem on NBC's hit drama ER.

In June 2009, Newton volunteered at the Oprah Winfrey LeadershipAcademy for Girls (OWLAG) in South Africa during Arts & Culture Week which aims to enrich the lives of the students through an international exchange of creative cultural expression and experiences. They help the girls to achieve excellence across more than a dozen art genres, from cooking and sculpture to traditional storytelling and dance.